Professor Amaratunga’s research focuses on disaster risk reduction for development, capability, and capacity building in built environment, with a particular interest in exploring construction’s role in that context. To date, she has over 400 published papers, and has had over 47 PhD completions. Her interests in this research area were kindled in her whilst working as a research scholar and she has progressed in several different contexts through projects and with doctoral students and Research Assistants. She also has interests in the areas of facilities management its sustainability and performance management and process improvement initiatives.

Her research interests include: 

• Disasters as a socially-constructed phenomenon, links between disasters and development.
• Climate change adaptation
• Disaster risk governance
• Disaster resilience from the perspective of the social/political, economic and physical sciences
• Understanding disaster risks
• Cities, urbanisation and disasters
• Preparedness for response and Post-Disaster Reconstruction
• Gender-Responsive Disaster Risk Reduction
• Disaster Risk Reduction in the Built Environment, and Social impact of reconstruction
• Capacity building for disaster risk reduction, mitigation and reconstruction
• Post-conflict reconstruction